Struggles
by Sasassy
Summary: Renji gets to know the 4th Ward and its mediator better. Yet somehow his feelings towards Uta remain confusing.


This was a submission for TG Rare Pair Week Day One "First time wearing significant other's clothes" on Tumblr.

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It didn't take long for Renji to learn that the 4th Ward was even more hostile than he'd expected it to be. Fights were breaking out left and right, sometimes it would be enough to walk down the street in broad daylight for another ghoul to openly attack him. Which was exactly what happened that day when he went out to wander the streets, trying to memorize the layout of the Ward so he knew the best escape routes should he need them. He'd just rounded a corner when he heard someone scream in anger and felt a piercing pain in his arm. Renji turned his head and assessed the wound, a thin trickle of blood was running down his forearm and a tentacle-like kagune was pulled out of his flesh immediately. Internally growling in anger he turned to face his attacker and braced himself for a fight. A ghoul who could ambush him like that had to be quite strong.

He stopped dead in his track when he saw a girl barely in her teens snarling at him like a wounded animal. He didn't recognise her but he knew he wouldn't fight her, no matter what she'd do to him.

"Go home," he said instead and made to leave but she came at him again, kagune feebly stabbing at him and her eyes opened wide in terror.

"Get away from me!" she screamed and clawed at him with blunt and dirty nails. Renji caught her wrists and immobilised her firmly but without applying to much pressure. She was tiny.

"Why are you attacking me?" he asked and searched her face. Should he know her?

"Let go of me!" was her only answer and she started kicking, landing a sucker punch to his gut. Groaning, he took both of her hands in one of his and used his free arm to get a hold of her legs. She twisted and struggled but he was too strong for her. After a few minutes she stopped her fight and her outraged screams turned into hiccupping sobs.

"What's going on here, Raven?"

Renji rolled his eyes and turned his head in the direction of the soft lilt of Uta's voice. Of course he'd show up.

"She attacked me out of the blue," he answered unwillingly. Uta was strict when it came to fights in his Ward and Renji wasn't sure if he'd spare a little girl his usual treatment just because she was a child.

"Did you now?" he asked the girl in a condescending tone and Renji wanted to give him a piece of his mind. She was a child and he an adult, he should act like it.

She didn't answer but her struggling picked up again when she saw the peacemaker of the 4th Ward with his bleached hair and weird sunglasses and that feral grin on his face.

"You're scaring her," Renji remarked and he couldn't help but feel a pang of protectiveness towards the little girl. She wasn't that much older than his own niece.

"I thought she attacked you," Uta said surprised. "Why are you trying to protect her?"

"She's just a kid. Look at her, she's pissing herself in fear," he growled and ignored the indignant screeching from the girl.

Uta sighed and shoved his sunglasses higher up his nose.

"Well then, little one, why did you attack a ghoul twice your size?" he asked and crouched down a little to get on her eye level.

She didn't answer him but squirmed even more in Renji's arms.

"Ah," the blond said mysteriously. "I see why." He got up and walked towards a small alley that held nothing but trash cans.

"Where are you go- ouch!" Renji was interrupted by the girl viciously biting his upper arm and actually taking a mouthful out of him. He was so surprised he dropped her and she dashed towards Uta as fast as she could, kagune ripping from her lower back again.

"There you are," Uta said quietly and kneeled down, looking at something behind a trash can. "Is she your sister?"

The girl froze, fists balled up at her sides and face a grimace of sheer terror.

"Don't hurt her," she begged through gritted teeth and Uta was cruel enough to chuckle at her. He picked up the toddler who was hidden in the trash and walked over to them again.

"I won't hurt her, little one," he said almost kindly and proved he was telling the truth when he held the half-unconscious girl in his arms to his chest almost protectively. "Can you tell me your names?"

"Yuki," the girl mumbled. "And I'm Kiko."

"Tell me, Kiko, where are your parents?"

She tensed up immediately and Renji's stomach dropped. He had a feeling he knew where they were and he'd had it. Everyone had the same story.

"The doves..." But Kiko couldn't finish and she dropped to her knees, sobbing uncontrollably.

"Renji, would you take her?" Uta asked softly. "We'll take them to a safe place."

Renji nodded and picked up the crying girl gently, holding her to his chest as if she could break at any second. She didn't struggle this time.

"Where are we taking them?" he asked but Uta didn't answer. He led them down intricate alleys that Renji didn't know yet until they were so deep into the Ward that he'd lost his sense of direction. They stopped in front of an inconspicuous door and Uta knocked, two short and three long ones, and beckoned them to wait. A few moments later a middle-aged woman opened the door just a fraction and stared at them.

"We found two more," Uta said and gestured at the girls. The woman nodded and opened the door just enough so Uta could step through. "You wait here," he said to Renji and handed Yuki to the woman before he took Kiko from Renjis arms and went inside. The door fell shut and Renji was left standing there.

It didn't take long for Uta to come back, alone. Without saying a word he walked away, towards where Renji supposed a busier street. He caught up with the blond and looked at him from the side.

"What will happen to them?" he asked and apparently his unease with the situation was showing.

"Relax, Renji, it's a shelter for orphaned ghouls," Uta answered, the gentleness in his voice he'd used for the children gone and transformed back to his usual lilt. "They are taken care of. In a 'they will be fed and brought up' kind of way," he assured Renji intently.

"Good," Renji answered and reprimanded himself for showing this side of himself to the other ghoul. He couldn't help but feel protective of the weaker ghouls amongst them, especially the children too young to take care of themselves, but he also knew that it was a weakness ruthless ghouls would exploit without blinking.

"You're too caring for your own good," Uta said with a mildly scolding tone. "Look at you, you're all bloody and torn up."

He was right, Renji's white shirt was a hot mess of his own blood and whatever dirt Kiko had transferred onto him. It was also ripped up from her scratching and her kagune. Sighing, he tried to remember where exactly his hideout was from here and how long it would take him to get there. He should just wait for nightfall so he could hide in the shadows. Right now, in broad daylight, he was way too suspicious.

"My place isn't far from here," Uta said suddenly and Renji's head snapped at him. "You could get cleaned up there and go home without attracting every Dove in the vicinity."

Renji contemplated the offer. He didn't want to take it since it would mean he'd owe something to the peacemaker, but he was out of options.

"Fine," he growled and hoped to show exactly how happy he was about being desperate enough to accept the help.

Uta chuckled at him darkly.

"Are we back to hating each other?" he asked but the taller man ignored him. "Oh well, we had a nice three weeks of friendship, then."

Friendship? Renji wanted to laugh at him. They weren't friends, they just stopped trying to kill each other. And he might or might not have confided his sob story in him. That didn't mean anything. Not at all.

They'd only walked for a few minutes before Uta took a sharp turn and climbed up a fire escape. Renji followed him, actually a bit curious about how the other ghoul lived. He was weird and eccentric and his apartment would probably reflect his personality.

And it did.

It was a tiny loft, just one room with an adjacent bathroom and bare brick walls, equipped with only the essentials, yet it looked quite cosy. There were art supplies strewn everywhere, brushes, pincers, needles, leather. He hadn't been lying when he'd said he liked crafting masks. There were a few in progress lying around too.

"Doesn't it hurt?" Uta asked suddenly and furrowed his brows in confusion.

"What?"

"Your arm," he said and pointed at the wound that was still oozing a bit of blood.

"Oh, that," Renji mumbled and touched a finger to it experimentally. "She went clean through, it looks worse than it is."

"You're an idiot. I meant the bite wound. She took out a good junk. Sit down." The blond tugged Renji down onto his ratty old couch and inspected the wound himself. His barely existent brows furrowed as he assessed the damage but he seemed to deem it non-threatening. "She got you good though, for such a tiny thing." He patted Renji's wrists with his hands and pushed his arms up. The silver-haired man complied and raised his arms and Uta tugged off his shirt. Renji tensed in surprised and felt his cheeks heat in embarrassment.

"Get cleaned up while I try to find a shirt that'll fit. You're massive," Uta said and absent-mindedly patted Renji's pectoral with his knuckles before he went over to a cupboard.

Renji did as he was told and washed off the worst of the blood and dirt at the sink. There was more of it than he'd expected, even on his chest and back and he had to double-check to make sure there weren't more wounds he just hadn't seen yet.

"I told you she got you good," he heard Uta's voice right next to him and he startled. How did he do that, sneak up on him like that?

"Haven't you crept up on me enough for one day?" he asked, annoyed with Uta's creepy behaviour.

"I wouldn't call it creeping up on you, Raven," he sing-songed.

"What would you call it then? Stalking?"

"You're the strongest ghoul in my Ward, I have to keep an eye on you."

"Is that why you where conveniently just there today?" Renji asked and raised his eyebrow. He'd been wondering how Uta had gotten there so quickly after the fight started. His senses were sharp but not that sharp.

"I wanted to talk to you and she ambushed you before I could make my appearance," he said with a nonchalant shrug.

"What did you want to talk to me about?"

"Nothing in particular."

Renji rolled his eyes at Uta's antics.

"Whatever. You found something I can wear?"

Uta held out a shirt and handed it to him. "There you go."

Renji pulled the tank top over his head and tried smoothing it down his chest, but it wouldn't quite work.

"How tiny are you?" he asked incredulous as he looked at the shirt stretched almost beyond its capability.

"How massive are _you_? Really, you're huge," Uta threw his hands up and left the bathroom. Renji followed him, feeling uneasy with his his torso so insufficiently covered.

"Sorry for having muscles?" he sulked.

"I have muscles too but you're still like a mountain. Here, try this." Another black fabric was thrown at him and Renji got it, quickly changing shirts. That one was actually better, not too tight around his arms and chest and it reached down to his wrists too.

"Thanks," he said and tugged it in place, fidgeting under Uta's scrutiny.

"Don't mention it. Just return it to me in one piece. It's my favourite to sleep in when it gets cold at night. Coffee?" he said and went over to his kitchen which basically consisted of a fridge and one counter with a coffee machine on it.

"Sure," Renji sputtered, unable to say anything else as his brain unhelpfully supplied him with imagines of a sleeping Uta and the fact that the shirt exuded a faint sweet and pleasant scent didn't help at all.


End file.
